


sunlight melt away

by amaresu



Category: Fallen London | Echo Bazaar, The Losers - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Judgment, Knotted Sock, The Correspondence (Fallen London)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 19:01:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6090897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amaresu/pseuds/amaresu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Most days Jensen doesn't think of dark caverns filled with lamp light and glim glow.  He doesn't think of words whispered in the wind and dark dreams of fire and death.  He doesn't listen for the words behind the thunder when the storms came in the summer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sunlight melt away

Once, a long time ago and further away than anyone would ever guess, Jensen had been Jake had been Jacob had been the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock. Barring the Fisher Kings (but the Fisher Kings don't count) sooner or later even urchins grow up, although they can take a bit longer to do so than most. Growing up though came with choices few wanted to face, but the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock had know that he could not hide from those choices forever, it was not his Destiny to remain as he was, the Bazaar and It's servants would force on him changes. 

The Thunder had told him so.

For the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock it happened during his last Christmas in the Neath. The lacre laid heavily on the streets and he watched over the younger urchins dancing in the footsteps of the Masters clearing pathways. The older children shifted and sorted through the lacre; some in buckets, some tossed aside, it was a delicate task finding the stuff worth anything. He had turned down an alley, to see a gray cat that was fond of him and would often trade secrets, when the shadow had fallen across him. He didn't jump or run as others would, he was the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock after all and as such Mr. Sacks wasn't a figure of terror. He bowed to the imposing figure in red, as was proper under such circumstances, the gray cat forgotten for the moment. 

Mr. Sacks' hood was a dark and seemingly empty cavern, but he could tell the Master was pleased. He spoke not a word, simply pulled a box from his bag and handed it over before leaving. He'd stared at the box for an unknown amount of time before the cat spoke up, “Mr. Sacks handing out gifts in rarely a good sign.”

He hadn't been able to respond before she'd twitched her tail and run out of the alley. Despite what people may say cats were incorrigible gossips, the news would be heard by those that needed to hear it by the time Mr. Fires started making his rounds. Running after her would be pointless, she had her own loyalties, as much as she might like him. Instead he did the only thing he could do and took to the Flit. He didn't run, because nothing would attract attention more than running and the last thing he needed was Fisher Kings or Raggedy Men deciding to follow. After some time he made his way to an old grouping of chimanies, formed in a circle and the perfect place to lay low in the middle. 

It was with more than a little fear that he'd opened the box Mr. Sacks had given him. Once he did he had a hard time not gasping as he found a bottle filled with a substance worth more than the Tears of the Bazaar or the Blood of the Masters themselves. Cider the Widow could only dream of selling, although perhaps she'd tasted it once. 

There was only one reason to give him such a substance. The Bazaar (or perhaps a Master or two working on It's behalf) had decided on his future. He'd known for some time it would not be his own to choose, but it was still hard to lay aside the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock and take up Jacob. Harder still to find descreet passage to where he needed to go, but he found ways.

Most days Jensen doesn't think of dark caverns filled with lamp light and glim glow. He doesn't think of words whispered in the wind and dark dreams of fire and death. He doesn't listen for the words behind the thunder when the storms came in the summer. He never explains his unease with Christmas. Not even to Holly, who found him on a school trip to England, laying on the ground gasping at the light of the Sun, and convinced her parents to take him home with them (he personally suspected other involvement, the Game moved ever onward after all). He doesn't talk about his fondness for cats or his refusal to eat mushrooms. Most days it doesn't even cross his mind anymore. His life is on the Surface. 

Today though was not most days. Today he is bound and gagged with his friends, facing down the man they know only as Max. Today he has a piece of paper and a pen in front of him and the lives of his teammates on the line. Max wants the decryption code for his servers, the ones Jensen locked down not five minutes before Max showed up. Max has the people and the power, he'll get the code one way or another, but as he said, “Why should I wait when you can tell me or watch your friends die?”

Today Jensen thinks of the shrieks from the beginning of time, the whispers in the night, and the way the Spires gleamed after the lacre fell. Today he writes, carefully, with eyes half closed. 

Today he says, “Most things fade and turn to ash on the Surface, the light of Judgment unmaking them as they first feel It's touch.”

He knows from the way Cougar starts to struggle and the dampness on his cheeks that blood has started to leak from his eyes, but he doesn't worry. Nothing feels like it's about to burst into flames. “Some things grow more powerful.” 

Jensen was once Jake was once Jacob and before all that he was the Lieutenant of the Knotted Sock. He danced behind the Masters and sang songs to make people go mad. He journeyed to Polythreme to make treaty with the King of a Hundred Hearts. He visited the mind of a long dead god to learn the truth behind the thunder. He read the Spires without fear.

Max wasn't ever anyone but Max. 

Jensen lifts the paper and shows Max the writing, two Correspondence symbols twisted together to form the phrase 'a future sacrificed to save those who hold your true heart'. Jensen watches without mercy as Max's eyeballs burst into flames, the liquid inside boiling almost instantly on sight of the paper. The rest of the Losers can't see the page, but the guards behind Max can. He burns the page on the flames covering the last body, consigning them to nothing once more. 

Later, after they finish taking apart Max's mad empire. After they've gotten their lives back and their revenge. After they're sitting at Holly's with Jolene and the kids the Losers look at Jensen and demand their explanations. He thinks about protesting and pretending there is nothing to tell. Instead he opens the box Holly said had been waiting for him since the day after Max died. 

Christmas was coming. Mister Sacks rarely gives one gift and never a second. This is from a different Master, although which one Jensen isn't sure. It seems the Bazaar has come calling. 

Inside is a card, sitting on a pile of moon-pearls that slowly melt away in the warm afternoon sunlight. The card is unsigned, but has a picture of a lamppost, covered in fog, with tentacles wrapped around it. For now he ignores the words on the back, talk of the Sixth City can wait. Instead he smiles and hears in his memory the songs they used to sing in the market place as they ran between stalls, “London wasn't destroyed in an earth quake.”


End file.
